10:26 P.M. Times Square, 24 December 1986

Snow falls on the just and the unjust alike, Momma used to say. Young and old, rich or poor, the open sky treats us all the same. Nina hoped God felt the same way, that He was every bit as open-minded as his heavens when He looked down on Times Square. That in his eyes a hooker deserved the same happiness as a housewife and had the same right as any mother to spend the holiday at home with her baby.

Christopher was only five months old and always sick with one thing or another. He had a problem the doctors called — congenial? Congenital? They all said he wouldn't live this long but he was still here to spite them, and she'd keep him alive one way or another, damn them.

She stood on Eighth Avenue above Forty-second Street, across from XXXtasy Video Center and the Cameo theater, "3 Super Hot Adult Hits." She'd been there most of the night between tricks; huddled against the wind in a short rabbit-fur jacket, tube top, hot pants, and platform shoes. Her work clothes.

Brown bangs blew around moist gray eyes that followed a chubby man who passed and kept walking until he was half a block away. He turned and walked back. Nina watched him search the street. No one nearby but sightseers, winos, hookers, and drug dealers — none of them could be cops, right? She nodded encouragement, watched him try to decide if she was a decoy.

"Hey, baby," she said, as he rushed past again.

Nina knew he wanted her. At seventeen, she was the youngest, prettiest white girl out here tonight and a real one to boot. All he had to do was make up his mind. It was too cold and too late for this shit. When he came back she stepped in front of him.

"Look, it's Christmas Eve. Time to go home and celebrate."

The guy looked down, embarrassed. "Yeah. Sure."

"Got a car?"

"No," he lied. "I hoped ..."

He mumbled into the wind.

"What?"

The man raised his face, red as Nina's cherry-colored lips.

"I want to tuck you in. Be your daddy, not just ..."

She rolled her eyes. "Jesus. That's extra, okay? There's a place down the block." Nina turned and walked down the icy sidewalk. The man didn't follow. She looked back and saw someone who didn't want witnesses.

"Anywhere else we can go?"

She tossed her head to one side, laughed.

"Your place or mine?"

"Yours, maybe?"

She spun away, headed down the street.

"Wait! I'll give you one fifty! Two!"

She stopped. God, this is stupid, she thought, real stupid. If it weren't Christmas Eve, if the rent weren't due, if baby weren't sick ... "Four. Twenty minutes," she said.

"Half hour for two fifty? That's all I've got." He paused, sighed. "Three. I'll leave right after."

You've got that right. In her head she located the Bowie knife she kept hidden under the mattress for protection, bought on sale almost a year ago at the army surplus down the street.

"Let me see it."

He pulled out a wad of new bills, fresh from a cash machine, counted them out, then tucked them back in his coat. She nodded. They started toward her place.

"Asshole," said Nina. "Show some girls a roll like that, they'd take you out, here on the street."

The john smiled at her, cheeks flushed with more than the cold. He hurried to keep up with her.

"You're not like that," he said. "It's my job to know people."

"Oh, shit. You're not a priest, are you? Or a shrink?"

He laughed. It was a nice sound. Maybe this wouldn't be all bad. Maybe this was God's way of getting her home early for his kid's birthday.

Maybe He did care.

By the time they got upstairs, Nina and her john joked like old friends. She opened the door to her apartment. Inside a nine-year-old girl watched MTV while finishing off a Twinkie and a joint.

"Yo, Carmen. He okay?"

The child nodded, sleepy, and held out her hand. Nina slapped a handful of bills into it.

"Here you go. Gracias mucho."

Carmen scampered out with a grin, whispered back season's greetings in Spanish as she giggled, and pulled the door shut behind her. The man stood by, out of place, while Nina locked the door, turned off the TV, and went to check on her baby. Christopher was still asleep, his thumb in his mouth. Nina smoothed the blanket and tucked it in. The heat wouldn't be up again tonight and he was still getting over his cold. She caught sight of their reflection in the cracked mirror over the bureau. She looked worn and pale next to her radiant boy.

"That the bed?" the man asked softly behind her.

"Don't worry. Clock starts when I say it does." Nina held out her hand. "Money first."

He pulled it out slow, like he still didn't trust her. She counted the bills and slipped them under the mattress in the baby's crib. Nina adjusted his blanket again and walked to her bed as she pulled off her jacket. She lifted an old Village Voice newspaper off the blanket, glanced again at the ad she'd circled in pink neon marker on the back page.

"DO YOU BELIEVE IN VAMPIRES?"

The apartment was cold, but that didn't explain the chill she felt or the goose bumps on her skin. She looked at the rest of the words, memorized from rereading, unable to believe they could be real. That anyone could ever believe her.

Nina tossed the paper on the floor. It was too late to save herself, but not Christopher. She'd answered the ad weeks ago, sent her diary home for safekeeping in case Adam found out she was going to tell what he'd done, what he was. If she could sell her story, maybe she could get enough money to save her son. But that money was months away, at best.

Nina unfastened the gold filigree crucifix hanging on a chain around her neck, a gift from her mother and another bleak reminder of the holiday. She dropped it on the night table and turned to look up at her john like the innocent little girl he wanted.

"I'm so sleepy, Daddy. Can you tuck me in?"

The man stepped closer, reached out and gently grazed her cheek with a fingertip. He moaned as he lifted Nina, carried her to the bed, and laid her down on the worn electric blanket. It hummed beneath them as he opened her skirt, her bra, slipped them off her freckled pink skin.

She looked away as he pulled off his jacket and shirt, climbed onto the bed, and kissed her softly, groaned. His rough, hairy chest scratched her bare nipples. His breath came in short, sharp gasps as he stroked her breasts, her ribs, her ass....

Then, without a sound, someone else was there.

"Naughty Nina ..."

A shadow fell across the john's face as he rolled away and saw an expensively dressed red-haired young man beside the bed.

"Hard at work, I see."

Nina sat up, stammered.

"Adam ..."

He raised an eyebrow, cold.

"I hear you've a tale to tell." Adam looked at her with large, beautiful eyes, one gray, one blue. "A tale to sell."

"Please, don't ..."

"Don't what?" he said. "Live up to my word? I told you what would happen if you ever told anyone."

"I didn't!"

The john reached toward his jacket.

"Look, buddy, whatever you want, it's yours."

He held out his wallet to no response. Adam ignored him as he dropped his black overcoat on an empty chair. He sat beside Nina, slipped an arm around her. She flinched.

The john slid to the edge of the bed and reached for his clothes. "Let me leave...